Real Time Social Advertising: Brands That Earned Gold, Silver and Bronze in the 2016 Olympics

Real time social marketing is the new way for businesses to earn eye-balls, attention, likes, retweets and ultimately sales! Currently 2 new trending topics in social sphere are – US Presidential Elections and Olympics in Rio.

Most of the brands ideally refrain from taking any political side to save itself from any reputational damage. Many brands thus capitalized on the other mega event – Olympics – to market their product/service to millions of Twitteratis. However, just like in Olympics on Twitter platform also there were winners and losers.

Here I list down 3 brands whose social team deserve a pat on their back for standing out on Twitter and winning medals:

#Bronze Winner: @McDonalds

Surprisingly, McDonald despite not having any strong social campaign or any excellent Twitter marketing strategy made it to the list of winners; the reason being their offline marketing strategy.

This official Olympics sponsor was offering free food to athletes and coaches in the Olympic village. Many famous athletes shared photos of munching on McDonald’s food. Moreover, some pictures of athletes lining up for their free McD food were also posted online. This started creating buzz about the brand on social platforms.

This largest restaurant chain in the world proved to be a great winner in Rio Olympics with thousands of social mentions.

The social team at McDonalds engaged Olympics fans on Twitter with some general Olympics hashtag like #Rio2016.

#Silver Winner: @Visa

This American multinational financial services corporation was one of the most talked brand on Twitter.

This brand sponsored the refugee team at Olympics with a mission to welcome Olympians from all walks of life irrespective of their culture, nationality, religion or physical ability.

The social team at Visa tried to seize the moment during the Olympics using hashtag #TeamVisa and #VisaLive. In its social campaign, Visa highlighted winner athletes by celebrating their successes. It even posted few videos showcasing athletes choosing Visa to pay at Rio 2016.

#Gold Winner: @CocoCola

Just as Olympic medalists are required to have concentration and consistency, a brand needs to have a clear focus and persistence (constantly posting about the current happenings) while leveraging real-time social marketing. The brand that won the first spot with these attributes is undoubtedly Coco-Cola, world’s largest beverage company and one of the sponsors of Olympic Games.

Coco-cola started a social campaign with hashtag – #THATSGOLD which as the event progressed attracted countless conversations on Twitter.

The social marketing team at Coco-Cola even created videos for the campaign that feature coke bottle performing Olympic sports like running, gymnastics, track and field, and diving.

Special Mention: Pierre de Coubertin Medal: @Dove

Not many are familiar with this award. This is a special decoration awarded to those Olympic athletes who provide some exceptional service during the Olympics. This year 2 athletes – Hamblin and D’Agostino were honored with this prestigious award for demonstrating the true Olympic spirit.

In social ecosystem the brand that earned an equivalent honorable mention is – Dove, a personal care brand. This brand nailed it with its social campaign #MyBeautyMySay.

As a part of this campaign, Dove is tweeting about facts and quotes from global media agencies that are found to be derogatory towards female athletes. Dove’s this campaign definitely has made a great impact on the social audience.

The social team at Dove is even inviting women from all over the world to share their own personal inspiring stories using the hashtag.

Missed Opportunity?

Olympics ended with a spectacular closing ceremony. Winners returned home with their medals – more social buzz, more social followers and more sales! Brands who failed to make it must not get disheartened and should take a cue from the real-time marketing strategies of the aforementioned winning brands and try again next time.

Tags: Digital Marketing Online Marketing Real Time Marketing Social Media Social Media Marketing Twitter